Illusions beget reality. Even in the gravity well, things force their way back out eventually. The gale battering my face, your molten footprints smudged into the pavement. Standing next to you is seismic. A kaiju-like construct of dense meat and projectile vomit. Tissue-thin. A patter of steps. A child's clapping game. A desert wind. Later, you disappeared. Show thy mercy. We will both sleep well tonight. You cross a four-lane highway with scarcely a glance. Your limbs move like the rocking of a ship. (I looked away from your glow that very first day) Heavy is the head (your north star, your overpacked dreams) heavy is the head that wears the crown (crown 0) but you bear the weight of your plastic jewels - it is all you know. Little miss white edelweiss, So nice. Up on the lonely hill you are planted, Could I sow my shame? Inhabited quiet. You grow with purpose. The tolerant glint of eyes in the grass.

---

Hey bleeding heart, neo noir _angel_ Hey clamshelled hestia rising from the sea Hey hammerer ringing metal on metal, feral car chaser, midnight ringer of bells Hey rocky waters running deep, un unraveller, patchwork princexx Hey shuttered all-seeing-eye, drug-lust, a 1000 vanishing eldrich arms bestowing unnameable gifts hey moving in your own clock-time always roaming betraying slipstreaming away to some other unknowable land, Hey After Mary of Nazareth bore her son, she disappeared. Is that fair? Is that just? She must have been all alone, tired and grunting in that animal-smelling room, all her teeth tumbling out of her mouth. Splittered seam to seam by wailing flesh. Show thy mercy. A jumble of angles, half-lit by sunlight, cold brew, You don't belong to this dimension. An asymptote approaching the mathematical limit. Here is a signal deadspot, the reception is weak here. Still, I swim upstream with your small words. You never fail to surprise me, but you have never changed through the years. That's not true: You have changed. That surprises me. Take, for instance, an all-grey chessboard, a rook and a bishop Skittering back and forth, two or three steps at a time, The inevitable stalemate. (The 50 move rule) The fact we play at all also surprises me, but I am a fool when it comes to such things. Supermarket tomatoes, presliced ham, American cheese, so on. I give it my all and all my honesty, as I always do, then I scrub my hands in the sink like Lady Macbeth. Invented details: The smell of earth after the rain Mushrooms? Bathroom cleaner? The furrowed brow and hasty goodbye. Real impressions: Dribbling a basketball Basil and scented wood An estate sale. Fabric faded by the sun. I would do it again. It's an art. I do it well. But I wouldn't go out of my way to do it.